Razing Ragnarok
by Thera Dratara
Summary: Sequel to 'catching up'. While Chaud is trying to cope with the Poseidon tournament and Lan, and ProtoMan is trying to cope with him, strange things happen at the tournament, that ask for investigation by the NetOfficials. Gameverse, Boylove.
1. Chapter 1

  
Disclaimer: I do not own Rockman/Mega Man or any of it components. These all belong to capcom.  
Warnings: Boy love.  
Other: my other Rockman.exe fic 'Catching-up' is a prequel to this, you might want to read it before you read this one.

* * *

When Chaud woke up this morning he had found himself lying next to Lan, with one arm slung over the boy.  
Now he was already showered and dressed, sitting on a comfy blue sofa next to the bed, watching how Lan slept while contemplating what happened yesterday.

It had been so easy to talk to Lan, like there was something that just clicked between them.  
Which was strange, considering nothing had ever seemed to be willing to click between them in the past.  
To Chaud, Lan had been an annoying, stupid and not to mention arrogant civilian, who thought that he could possibly do fight the skilled hackers and terrorists of the WWW.  
Hell, the first time they met, the boy had ran straight into a trap of the WWW, helping them to release the poisoned water of the occupied waterworks.  
Afterwards the kid had been able to fix his own mistakes, but he still didn't get any respect from Chaud, even destroying the life virus didn't impress him.

Lan then had the gall to join the officials, and invited Chaud to some camping trip.  
Chaud, who was used to people trying to use him for networking purposes only, had seen this as Lan trying to benefit from from his status as a S-ranked net-official.  
Chaud had been disgusted at this and declined his offer, but unfortunately the commander had sent him on a mission that same evening to investigate the threat of the dam being blown up at that same camp-site.  
The camping trip went really well, besides the fact someone actually did try to blow up the dam.  
Lan's friends turned out to be rather rational people who had known Lan ever since he was little, and not the bunch of rabid fans Chaud was afraid of.  
He got along with Mayl, and she insisted to him, that Lan didn't have any hidden agenda's:  
"Lan's barely able to keep whatever he got for my birthday – if he even remembered it – secret, and you think he can manipulate people like that? Chaud, you don't know Lan very well, do you?"  
He didn't have the time to think about this, and wouldn't for a long time, as the Gospel attacks followed each other in rapid succession. Which of course didn't stop until Lan pulled some stunt that made the world at peace again.  
Afterwards, he figured that maybe Mayl had been right and Lan had meant the invitation as a honest attempt at being friendly.

He also felt himself become envious of Lan's large group of friends, as he didn't have any childhood friends himself.  
When he expressed this to ProtoMan, he got the following question fired back to him: "Then what am I?"  
He replied it with "You're my Navi.", and said Navi disappeared to be found again a few hours later, brooding in the cleaning machine of the bathroom downstairs, but not after Chaud had scanned the whole house for his presence.  
The following days ProtoMan stayed unusually reserved to everyone, including Chaud.

Later Lan proved again that he didn't care about screwing Chaud over by saving Chaud's father and ProtoMan from the evil clutches of a crazy TV producer.  
The fact that he did this by assaulting the producer with MegaMan's PET, didn't take away any of Chaud's gratefulness.  
It was after that event that he sarted to consider Lan as a person he could really trust, no matter how often the boy walked into traps of the WWW.  
Which was good, because Lan appeared to be a very useful partner in ending future crisises, to the point that Chaud actually admitted he needed his help.

And now he was here, sitting on a blue couch in one of the many suites of the M/S Nereid with this warm feeling in his gut and a sleeping Lan on his bed, opposite of him.  
And they'd... Well, fooled around big time – he had a bit of muscleache due it – the evening before, and he didn't know where this was supposed to lead.  
Lan already had a wonderful girlfriend in Mayl, and his father wouldn't be happy to know that he would never be called grandfather in his whole life.  
No, this whole thing had been a mistake, and he was certain Lan would agree with him, if he woke up that is...  
Chaud looked at the clock, which said it was seven in the morning.  
With that, and what he knew about Lan, he was certain the other boy wouldn't wake up for another hour or two.  
So Chaud opted to go and search for ProtoMan instead, who had disappeared again, as he usually did when confronted with sexuality in general.  
Chaud stood up and headed for the door, but stopped.  
He turned back towards lan, but decided against it, and hurried himself out of the suite.

ProtoMan had, aside from MegaMan chaneling the intimacy of their operators, a nice night.  
He had spent it with the blue Navi as his companion, exploring the ship.  
The M/S Nereid's network was nearly void of viruses, and ProtoMan figured that they had hired virus busters to clean it out regularly, which was rather ironic, as the tournament had attracted sixteen of the best netbattlers to the ship. It was as if you held a convention for pest control, and had to hire a special company to get rid of the rats in the kitchen.  
The network was aside from clean also gigantic, even with all the suites' network being restricted the place was even bigger then most suburb networks, it even had it's own NetSquare!  
MegaMan, who had told him all sorts of stuff regarding the problems he had with Copyroids, was very quiet in the beginning. ProtoMan thought that one one hand this could be because of what happened at the digital café, but on the other hand, it could also be because they didn't know each other very well. Seeing how most of their conversations had been shouts in the heat of battle, it was not much of a wonder they didn't know each other that well, their operators usually did the talking anyway.  
Although, Chaud and Lan seemed better at annoying the hell out of each other rather then having actual civil conversations, they seemed to be doing great yesterday, but after what happened in the café, ProtoMan supposed that they had been aided in their civility by biological factors.  
But he couldn't blame them for arguing so much, Chaud had never been that friendly, and he guessed that Lan had his bad moments too.  
Out of curiosity, he asked MegaMan about it:  
"Yes, Lan can sometimes be very thoughtless in what he says." Confirmed the Navi, "What made you bring that up?" He asked, slightly confused.  
"I was thinking of how our netops used to argue." Replied ProtoMan.  
"Ah," Was MegaMan's reply, "Yes, they used to be very good at making each other angry, weren't they?" He smiled, and continued: "To think that they'd be... well... uhm..."  
He stopped at that line, and looked away in embarrassment over what happened.  
They stood still now, and ProtoMan was becoming uneasy. He looked around, to see if there was something that allowed for a change of subject, and found it in a blue skinned Navi and his green Comapanion.  
"Ah, it's FreezeMan and PlantMan..." As soon as he said it, he wondered why the hell those two where here at all, together at that.  
Sure, their operators where both manipulated into netcrime by Wily himself, but ProtoMan couldn't imagine that Miss Anetta and Mr. Obihiro had met at ex-hacker-therapy and their Navi's started hanging out with each other because of that.  
MegaMan was happy with the diversion, and went to greet the two Navi's.  
The conversation that followed made ProtoMan lose his faith in human civilisation, as it appeared that not the operators, but the NetNavi's themselves had met at group therapy...

Netnavi group therapy...

To process their trauma's and repress their criminal tendencies...

Instead of, you know, reprogramming...

ProtoMan didn't quite get it either...

Meanwhile, FreezeMan and PlantMan were praising the therapy into heaven and ProtoMan was grateful when MegaMan decided to change the subject into that of the tournament:  
"So, there's some pretty interesting people participating, don't you think?" He said.  
"Yes, indeed." Agreed FreezeMan, "It's an honour to meet with all the Navi's here, I personally would love to fight Colonel or Phoenix."  
"Phoenix?" Asked Megaman, he turned to ProtoMan "Isn't she that female Navi?"  
"Yes, she's the mascot of the ESTek company."Said Protoman, "She has quite a fan base, if I recall correctly." he commented with distaste, after remembering having seen one of the many fan sites for the lady program, it had not been a very pleasant experience...  
"I see..." Said MegaMan, "So, Colonel's here too? Man, there's so many familiar faces at this tournament..." He continued observingly.  
"Familiar? I barely know any here!" Exclaimed PlantMan, "Hell, I don't even know who Fabio here is!" He said, gesturing to ProtoMan.  
FreezeMan raised an eyebrow, and MegaMan snorted, trying to hold his laughter.  
"Fabio?" ProtoMan repeated, "The model?"  
"Yeah,he's blond too, right?" PlantMan said, "Sure, he's a bit taller, and a bit more muscular..." PlantMan stopped to take a better look at the red Navi, "And more handsome looking in general, but the resemblance is there!" he finished happily.  
ProtoMan had wanted to kill him right then and there, but instead he chose to stare at him, hoping to nerve him out. MegaMan However, decided to interrupt: "PlantMan, don't tease him like that, you do know ProtoMan right?"  
"Yes..." PlantMan said, "Ah, he's ProtoMan then?" he asked perplexed, "Man, I imagined you a bit..."  
"Taller? More Muscular? More Handsome?" Suggested ProtoMan scathingly.  
PlantMan looked like he wanted to say something, but then he turned away, as if he heard something and was trying to listen to it.  
ProtoMan then heard a bossy female voice seemingly coming from PlantMan himself.  
"PlantMan, can you hear me?" ProtoMan supposed this was Miss Anetta's voice, PlantMan's operator. "Yes Ma'am, I can hear you loud and clear." PlantMan said.  
"Good, could you come back to the suite? I need your help with those backups" Said Miss Anetta's voice casually.  
"Yes Ma'am, I'll be there in a sec!" Plantman turned to the other Navi's, "Sorry guys, the missus needs my help, so I got to go." Before logging out, he added, "It was fun talking to you!"  
"I ought to be going too" said FreezeMan to the others.  
"You too?" Asked MegaMan with a hint of sadness in his voice, had ProtoMan not known the blue navi disliked good-byes, he would've felt insulted at the implication of himself being bad company.  
"Yes, Lord Sean would be worried if he woke up and finds me missing." FreezeMan replied.  
"Alright, I'll see you tomorrow then!" MegaMan grinned.  
FreezeMan nodded in agreement, before he also logged out.  
This left MegaMan and ProtoMan alone in the hall.  
MegaMan spoke: "Maybe we should go back too" He suggested.  
"You can go if you like, but I would rather wait at the café" said ProtoMan, "I don't feel like finding out how intimate they've been."  
"Ah, yes..." MegaMan looked embarrassed at the mention of their operators, "Uhm, would you mind if I go with you."  
"Do as you wish" ProtoMan responded.  
MegaMan smiled and started to walk back to the direction where they'd came from, but ProtoMan decided to stop him; "The café is the other way."  
"We've been walking in a circle then?"  
ProtoMan nodded, and head for the café.

The trip back had been rather event less save for the vendor who kept insisting that they should buy from his gift store and kept yelling "Speshul prize 4 U!".  
At the café ProtoMan had started reading magazine's again, because the night had ended, and the staff had replaced the magazines.  
MegaMan was sitting across the table, playing a card game with SearchMan of all people, apparently the latter hadn't seen MegaMan in quite a while, and they were catching up while playing the card game. As long as it wouldn't turn into 'Catching up', ProtoMan didn't mind their loud conversing.  
Suddenly, somewhere during an article about the new medical uses for nuclear radiation, ProtoMan heard the sound of a transmission link being made between his program and what seemed to be Chaud's PET.  
Sighting, he lay away the magazine and opened the communication window, waiting for the link to enstablish.  
When it did, Chaud's face appeared in the window.  
"ProtoMan, where are you currently?"  
"At the café, Sir." Answered ProtMan, "You want me to log out?" he added.  
"How's Lan?" The conversation had piqued the interest of the two Navi's, and MegaMan was standing behind ProtoMan, staring at the communication window for a reply.  
"He's doing fine." Was Chaud's answer, "He's currently sleeping at my suite, you can ask ProtoMan for the P-code, if you want to wake him up yourself." he suggested.  
MegaMan smiled and nodded.  
Chaud then turned his attention back to ProtoMan. "ProtoMan, we have a long day ahead, so please do log out." and with that, the transmission ended.  
ProtoMan sighted once again, yes, Chaud had become more polite and thoughtful towards him, but he still had moment that made him want to kick him. He made a file containing the P-code to the network of Chaud's suite and gave it to MegaMan. "It's room 128, you can access it from NereidComp2" He explained. "Thanks!" MegaMan smiled again."Your leaving now? Will I see you later?" He asked.  
ProtoMan nodded, and logged out.

Chaud did have a bit of trouble finding his Navi, and the though security of the ship's network didn't make it any easier to find him.  
Eventually he just gave up finding ProtoMan all by himself, and asked the staff if there was a digital caf'e in the network, and where it would be the easiest to access that place.  
One of the co-workers advised him to try jacking into the coffee vending machine in the dinner hall.  
Chaud followed the unusual advise, and found himself being able to set up a transmission lick with his Navi from there, and was able to call ProtoMan back to his PET.  
After he had done so, his Navi had seemed strangely annoyed, and greeted him with a scathing tone of voice: "Had a _good_ night, sir?"  
Chaud briefly wondered if the words 'got lucky' had appeared on his forehead.  
He's straightened his bangs to make sure that if it was there, it would be covered, while feeling his face heat up. ProtoMan made an annoyed sound.

"Ah, look who we have here" Said an elderly female voice.  
Chaud turned around to find the voice belonging to an elderly pale woman.  
"It's Eugene Chaud, isn't it? My name is Ann, Countess of Zap"   
Said Ann Zap, "We are competing today." She clarified while holding out her hand.  
Chaud shook her hand and replied " Yes, I'm Eugene Chaud, it's nice to meet you, lady Zap"  
"'Lady'? Mr Chaud, you flatter me! " She smiled, "You can call me Madam Zap if you want."  
She looked around the dinner hall, " It's nice to see that my first opponent is and early bird like myself." She turned to Chaud again. " Say, would you like to join me for breakfast?" She asked.  
Chaud said he would love to.

A few minutes later he found himself sitting at a table that was stacked with delicious food.  
Mrs Zap was sitting opposite of him and was putting milk in her empty teacup, " So, Mr Chaud, what are you hoping to find at this tournament?"   
"I'm here to represent IPC, the company of my father, they want a business deal with ESTek." Chaud answered.  
He had no idea what the name was supposed to mean, but ESTek was the main sponsor of the Poseidon Tournament, and a huge Netopian robotics company.  
IPC was a huge computer hardware company, obviously, they were a match made in heaven.  
At least, that's what the guy from marketing had thought.  
"I see, it must be quite a job." The elderly lady mused, she reached for the teapot and said "To be honest, I'm here for the prize money. My family isn't that rich any more, you see, and the house really needs to be renovated."   
"It must be really old then." Chaud replied with genuine interest.  
"Oh, yes, it's very old" Mrs Zap told him, "It was build after the first world war by my great great grandfather Jason Pones, but the house is more a victim of being poorly kept rather than age.  
My husband tries, but as you may understand, he's more of a technician then a handyman." She smiled.  
Chaud smiled back, he remembered staying with his aunt after his mother had died.  
She lived in this gigantic though warm house at a little place called angel's beach that lay in the west of Creamland. He had fond memories of the place, especially considering he received ProtoMan there, who had looked much like a standard Navi at the time.  
" Aren't you going to eat, Mr Chaud?" asked Mrs Zap, shaking Chaud out of his memories.  
"Ah, yes, I forgot." Said Chaud bewildered, and started to eat.  
The dinner hall was slowly filling up with people of all sorts: Netbattlers; Sponsors; or just people who were rich enough to effort a ticket for the tournament.  
Mrs Zap and Chaud talked about the new drivers for quadruple core processors, and Chaud was slightly surprised to find that Mrs Zap had a very good understanding of computers, she explained to him that she graduated in physics and computer technologies, and that she had been a programmer in her younger days.  
"But I can't do that any more, with all these new programming languages, my spectacular knowledge of basic and C+ is useless."  
The hall was crowded when they finished around half past nine.  
"Well then, I'll hope to be seeing you at the arena later this day Mr Chaud." Said Mrs. Zap.  
"Yes, I expect a good fight from you, Madam Zap." Was Chaud's respond.  
"I ought to guarantee you it will be! Goodbye Mr Chaud." And with that, Ann Zap left.

While Chaud was watching the elderly lady leave, ProtoMan gave a small cough that Chaud usually interpreted as ' Give me attention! NOW!' as ProtoMan had done some pretty awful stuff when his coughing was ignored. One particular incident came to mind, and to Chaud's knowledge, his word processor was still traumatised by the event.  
Chaud took out his PET and looked at the small screen to find the red Navi compressing his e-mails. "What's wrong ProtoMan?"  
"Sir, shouldn't we be training for our fight? Elecman is quite a strong Navi, I've heard." Was the reply.  
"I suppose, if we can find a place to train" Chaud said.  
"We don't have to search any more sir, there's a training room down the hall on your right." Said ProtoMan, Chaud observed that his Navi was quite enthusiastic about training.  
"I see, thank you ProtoMan." Replied Chaud and he went for the door on his right.  
However, after going into the hall, Chaud stopped as he saw something that caught his interest:  
Lan, who had finally woken up, and Sean, and ex-hacker.  
And they were talking.

* * *

**Author's Notes:**  
I finally started this fic, I took some time to get a plot, but I have it(somewhat). And the chapters are longer too!  
I'm trying to see if I can combine a good plot with romance, and I hope the two different POV's will help me with that.  
English isn't my first language, and while this fic was spellchecked, it's not beta'ed, as I don't have a beta in this fandom.(Yes, I am searching:)) But beta or not, if there's any weird inconsitencies, gramar rule breaking, or other things that bother you, don't hestiate to leave a note!  
Because there's probably gona be a lot of questions and sidenotes, aswel as drawings from my side, I'll make a little section in my bio-page for Razing Ragnarok to collect all these things.  
Anyway, please tell me what you think of it! 


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: I don't own Rockman.exe/Megaman battle network or any of it's components. There's a few OC's in the fic, but that's it.  
Warnings: Boy Love, some heavy language.

* * *

Sean Obihiro was the ex-gospel leader who had repented his crimes by serving as a valuable information source concerning the WWW and the Undernet in general. But Chaud didn't care about that, nothing could stop him from hating the boy. Who cared if he had lost his parents at early age? Who cared if he was ignored by his relatives, and fit the stereotype of a lonely rich boy? Who would even care if the kid was a genius? Chaud was all of that too: Mother had died when he was about six, father had ignored him and his wishes most of his life, he was rich, had little friends, and he graduated college two years ago. Yet you didn't see _him _start up netmafia's and conduct organised netcrime!

And Lan was talking to him, being friends...

Quickly, without thinking, he moved he moved towards the pair.

"So Lan, you finally woke up!" he said.

Lan turned his head and Sean looked at him curiously.

"Chaud!" Said Lan enthusiastic, his face brightening. "Where were you this morning?"

"This morning?" Interjected Sean confused.

"Ah, well," Stammered Lan, trying to find a way to explain himself, but Chaud wouldn't let him.

"He stayed the night at my room"

Lan stared at him with slight confusion, his face going red.

"I see" Replied Sean, "But why weren't you in your room when Lan woke up" he continued, directing his eyes to Lan.

Lan looked highly uncomfortable under Sean's stare, and Chaud wondered what exactly was going on, but he none the less replied: "I went to look for ProtoMan, my navi."

Sean's face transformed into a nasty expression: "must be fun to have your navi run away from you all the time..." He sounded almost musingly.

"At least he knows he can without fearing punishment..." Chaud replied coolly, he wasn't going to let Sean win.

Lan however looked extremely uncomfortable, not just from the look Sean had given him, but from their little argument in general. "Guys...?"

Sean noticed Lan's lack of comfortableness: "It was nice to chat with you again, Chaud" He muttered monotonously, "But Lan and I should really be getting our breakfast, shouldn't we, Lan?"

"Eh?" Was Lan's intelligent reply.

But Sean was already walking toward the doors of the dining hall, so Lan turned around on more time. "I'm going with Sean now, but I'll see you later, okay?" He asked with a sad smile, and then he followed the grey haired boy into the dining hall. At that moment, Chaud felt like he wanted to lash out and strangle Sean, but he let it slide and watched his friend disappearing into the dining hall.

As he stood there, the boy contemplated following the other two, but he supposed that Lan wouldn't be able to appreciate his company with Sean so close.  
That, and he felt that ProtoMan was getting uneasy again...

Chaud continued down the well-lit hall, trying to find the training room.

ProtoMan thought the training didn't go as well as he would've liked. This was because Chaud seemed very much out of it during training, almost daydreaming. ProtoMan even suspected that it had something to do with their meeting with Mister Obihiro and Lan before, as Chaud had been like this ever since then. The whole thing annoyed ProtoMan to no end, as it was terribly embarrassing to run from a mettaur because Chaud hadn't injected a battlechip in time.

In general, ProtoMan would say he deeply disliked the developments of the past few days:

First Chaud was 'catching up' then he and MegaMan were witness of said 'catching up' and now Chaud was daydreaming.

Others might've found this cute, but the red navi had absolutely no interest in love, and thought that if his operator had to be in love, he shouldn't let it get in the way of his work. It was just highly unprofessional, and it annoyed ProtoMan to no end.

He decided to voice his opinion: "Sir" He called.

"Yes ProtoMan?"

"While I'm sure to be happy for you that you are in love, but please stop daydreaming, we're training." He said monotonously.

The response was as expected, very un-chaudlike: "I'm what?" But the boy's face tinted red, and he averted his eyes before trying a more sarcastic approach: "Pray do tell, ProtoMan, with whom should I be in love then?"

"With the person of last night? Unfortunately, we know what you two have done..."

"What?" His operator asked incredulously "How do you know, and what do you mean by 'we'?"

ProtoMan was truly amazed that Chaud had forgotten about the connection between Lan and MegaMan. Being too subtle would obviously not work today. "Sir, you do remember that Lan and MegaMan are officially twins, do you not?"

"Yes..." At that point, Chaud seemed to realise what his navi was getting at: "The connection..."

"Indeed." Replied ProtoMan, while he observed how the skin colour of his master started to clash with his with his blouse.

"I'm sorry." The boy stammered, looking shocked "That wasn't my intention..."

"I doubt it was." ProtoMan replied coldly.

After a minute or so, he broke the silence: "Sir, shall we continue training?"

Chaud nodded, and activated the training program again.

The training was finished quietly, but Chaud hadn't recovered from the shock yet, and question were still running amok in his mind: So what he had done to Lan was also felt by MegaMan? Did that mean he had sex with the navi too? Or worse, did that mean he had raped Lan's twin brother without knowing it? Did Lan know? How did _his _ navi feel about it?

The more he thought about it, the more his head was being filled with questions. The fact that ProtoMan was quite obviously angry with him didn't help matters either. Was he angry because of what happened? Or was he annoyed about something else?

Aside from all these things, Chaud found himself walking to the battledome. The first fight had started already, and Chaud looked at a big screen detailing the fight, to find the contestants: One one side it was Baryl with Colonel.exe and on the other side it was this kid called Hector Nasso with a navi named Pheonix.exe.

Chaud momentarily frowned at the clichéd name of the navi, but then he recalled that he knew someone who had named his navi 'MegaMan' of all things. Remembering what he had done to that person, he quickly returned his attention to the fight.

As far as Chaud knew, Hector Nasso was the son of Nicolas Nasso, the president of ESTek, but from looking at the fight, he also learned that the boy favoured fire related ranged attacks, and that he had a female navi, who was successfully summoning a flame tower, while dodging Colonel's HeroSword attack.

Colonel, as a melee navi, was at disadvantage against a ranged navi such as Phoenix, and the fact that the dark clad navi was being being locked in due half the battle field having turned into a lava pool, was not helping his case.

Upon seeing the lava, Chaud made a mental note to include an ice-seed chip in his folder, if he were ever to fight the boy, but he couldn't say he was surprised when Colonel lost the battle, even tough it was the first time he saw Nasso fight.

Trough the speakers it was announced that the next fight would be between Anetta with PlantMan.exe and Reiko with FlashMan.exe. The match-up was an interesting one, seeing how on both sides had been hackers in the WWW in it's second uprising This meant not only that they knew how the other fought, but also that both had Willy's version of the synchronisation technique at their command.

The only thing Chaud could use to predict the outcome of the fight, was that PlantMan was a wood type, and FlashMan was an electric type. This meant that PlantMan Had a significant advantage toward FlashMan. Of course, Reiko could negate this disadvantage by choosing the correct chips. But Chaud knew from experience that most people usually didn't bother picking the correct ones, so he didn't count on it.

In fact, the only person of which he knew that did such a thing was Lan. But then again, Lan's speciality was the ability to change his fighting style at a whim, so it's expected from him to be so flexible. In contrast with Chaud himself, who preferred to stick to one style, but use the correct chips when necessary.

Finding that his train of thought had brought him yet again to Lan, he wondered where the young boy was. But Chaud figured that Lan would still be in the company of that grey haired thing called Sean, so he didn't feel particularly interested in joining Lan. None the less, he searched the crowd for a glimpse of the boy.

The dome was rather large, but fortunately, not crowded, and Chaud spotted Lan. As expected, Sean was next to him, chatting vigorously. Chaud wondered what they were talking about. The fight? The food? The past few years? Him? If they were talking about him, what were they telling each other? 'Hey Lan, that Chaud guy's an asshole, isn't he?' 'He's not so bad, he dry-humped me last night.' Chaud quickly shook away that ridiculous conversation in his head. Even Lan wouldn't have brought it like that.

But he still couldn't shake of the conversation. If he could get closer, he might be able to overhear what they were saying though.

Before he could think twice, he caught himself planning on how to get close enough to overhear everything, by going on that balcony and sit a few rows behind Lan and Sean.

However, Chaud was burning with curiousity and he figured that satisfying his curiousity was worth taking the risk of getting caught.

So after taking one last look at the fight(PlantMan was happily strangling FlashMan, and Chaud sincerely hoped that the navi had psychiatric treatment.) Chaud left for the balcony, navigating himself through long white halls to get there. When he got there, the was surprised to find out the balcony had been hired by miss Millions

Chaud's feelings about miss Millions were mixed: On one hand she was a surprisingly endearing lady in all her vileness. Yes, she was cruel, but the rich lady was very strong as well as a great business woman. On the other hand, she had the worst mood swings, often cause by sheer boredom, and Chaud wasn't sure if wanted to get in one of her bad moods.

Unfortunately, or perhaps fortunately, miss Millions made his thoughts of uncertainty in vain, as she saw him in the door opening. "Mister Chaud, what an utter delight to see you here." She said, the words falling out of her mouth as if they were mercury, "Please, why don't you join me?"

Seeing as this got him closer to Lan and Sean, he accepted her offer.

"It's a delightful battle, isn't it?" She said. Chaud looked at the battle field in front of him.

'Delightful' and 'fight' weren't really the words he would use to describe the scene that was played out in the arena. 'Horrendous slaughtering' was more descriptive. It was then that his mind decided to remember that Anetta had access to the synchronisation technique. Chaud swallowed out of nervousity, and decided that he would like to stay away from the redhead from now on.

"Yes it is very delightful." He replied while attempting to smile at miss Millions.

She smiled back.

"Miss Anetta is nothing compared to Sean though." She gestured at the boy at the other end of the balcony. He and Lan were huddled together, and Sean was wispering something into Lan's ear. What were they saying? What was sean talking about? What was Lan listening to?

Chaud felt his disgust for the grey haired boy return in full force.

"I'm not surprised." He said in a low tone. He turned back to miss Millions, who was observing him with a very pensive look.

After a moment, she replied: "I feel the same, but you well-known hatred is putting up quite a display, mister Chaud" Shooting him an unimpressed look, she continued: "I can, however, assure you that Sean is not like you perceive him to be."

This made a bell rinkle in the boy's head. "You're sponsering him?" he asked. She said nothing and just sipped her ever-present wine.

Chaud looked back at Sean and Lan. Sean seemed annoyed at something, moving his lips quite vehemently. Lan was listening to him with a sad frown. Chaud tried to make out what sean was saying by reading his lips: 'Asian ach so'? That couldn't be right. He tried re-enacting Sean's lip movements. "Such an asshole." Then he heard an angry snort next to him. Miss Millions was giving him a particularly vile look, and it occurred to him, he shouldn't have said that out loud. He decided to say nothing and stared out onto the battlefield.

PlantMan had won the battle and was currently standing there with a cocky grin on his face, receiving multiple cheers from his fans. After Anetta logged him out, the boyish voice of Ribitta resounded through the stadium "And after this won-der-ful battle between nature and technology, we still have two more top of the bill fights before lunch break! For those who are hungry, don't be shy and order a big hot dog from our FUNDOG employees!"

"Well said, Ribitta." Yelled a low male voice through the speakers. "Now for our next fight!"

Ribitta's voice took over the intercom again: "In our next fight, we shall see the true power of fire, for he's here! The man with hair the colour of fire and a burning passion for the battlefield! Ladies and gentlemen, give a scorching hot welcome to Mister... MATCH!"

The crowd clapped enthusiasticly as Mister Match walked onto the stage. Chaud knew the man as an another ex-WWW hacker, and he wondered what all these hackers were doing at the Poseidon tournament. Lan trusted the guy though, even though said guy tried to blow up his house and later SkyLab. But then again, Lan trusted too many people, like Sean.

Chaud looked at the pair again, to his surprise Sean had gotten up and was turning around.

And for a moment, Chaud and Sean had direct eye contact.

With fascination Chaud watched how Sean's orange-red eyes looked at him in shock, realising that he might have heard the conversation. The other boy's face turned away, face red, in what Chaud supposed was anger and embarrassment . This attracted Lan's attention, and caused him to understand the situation. "Chaud, I didn't know you were there!" He smiled at him.

Suddenly, Sean ran was him, muttering a quick good-bye to miss Millions before heading out to the hallway.

"Don't let me down boy!" yelled miss Millions, her voice suddenly sound raw and proud, and Chaud had the feeling he was sitting next to a lioness.

"Hey Chaud," Called Lan, "Come sit next to me."

Chaud looked at miss Millions. She looked back and said "Well, go on then!"

He didn't need more encouragement to get up and went over to Lan, sitting down as the announcers mentioned something about a devil girl.

Lan smiled brightly at him, and Chaud felt his whole body heat up, as if he had become a human heater, ready for someone to put their socks on for drying. He gave a small smile back, but Lan's attention was at the battlefield already. "Look, it's Shuuko with AquaMan!" Chaud turned to the battlefield too, and saw that on the opposite side of the redheaded ex-hacker, the polace was taken by a cute blue haired girl with a very sad aura about her. Chaud wondered why the announcers had called her a 'devil girl' as she only seemed to induce pity with him.

When he told Lan, the other boy agreed with him in pitying her, but her explained that her nickname was due the amount of bad luck this girl had. Chaud found this a bit vague, but then the power fell out. "Nevermind" he said defeated, while Lan shot into laughter.

ProtoMan didn't notice much of the power outage except that the number of wi-fi signals went down massively. This initially alerted him, as it could be the work of hackers, but Roll, who had a program guide, reassured him that it was just because Shuuko was on stage. At his gesture of confusion, she knowingly said: "Don't ask, it's complicate."

The notion that he was too stupid to understand earned the pink navi a glare, though ProtoMan supposed the message never came across due his visor, which only made him even more annoyed.

He met up with Roll in Lan's PET as MegaMan invited him to watch the battles with them. Roll apparently came in only a few hours ago, through a satellite connection, and even though she annoyed him now, he rather liked the her. He even found himself happy to see her again, even thoguh he didn't know her very well.

"Shuuko and AquaMan are known for their bad luck." Explained MegaMan. "Hence the 'devil girl'ofcourse." added SnakeMan, who had joined them from miss Millions PET. "I wonder what is taking them so long." he sissed while staring at the black screen that should have shown the fight, but instead said 'keinen signale' being software from Kingsland.

"I haven't got a clue either." said MegaMan "You never know in these situations, for we can guess, we won't be able to see the fight till tomorrow."

"Oh please don't say that!" replied SnakeMan. "Miss Millions is going to have a fit if she won't see her dear Sean fight today!"

"Obihiro?" asked ProtoMan, SnakeMan nodded.

"Yes, the next fight will be between FreezeMan and SkeletonMan" Said Roll, pointing at the names in her program guide.

"You don't say, a fight that isn't completely predictable" was ProtoMan's scathing reaction.

Roll smiled "It seem that the majority of the fights this afternoon won't be decided through type weakness."

"I see" Replied ProtoMan out of politeness.

"Hey MegaMan," SnakeMan again "You wouldn't have chairs, would you?"

MegaMan looked embarrassed "I've forgotten them, haven't I?"

"Unless they're invisible" said ProtoMan.

MegaMan looked hurt from that reply, but searched for chair applications anyway. A few minutes later, MegaMan booted up four chairs, which were neon pink for some vague reason. Roll sat down immidiatly, not having a problem with the colour, and ProtoMan, who couldn't be bothered eihter, sat down next to her.

SnakeMan however, stared at the chair dubiously, and then at MegaMan, also dubiously. "Is something wrong" Asked MegaMan with an annoyed tone.

"Uh, well... the colour..." was SnakeMan's reply.

"Reprogram it if it's such a bother" Interjected ProtoMan "But hurry up, the system's back on." he said gesturing to the screen showing Shuuko in complete distraught and Match trying to comfort her.

ProtoMan sat back, listening to the clichéd commentary of Ribitta. The might be predictable, but it could still be amusing.

TBC

* * *

**Author's Notes:  
**Second chapter up, finally!  
I've been buzy with a lot of other stuff, so I'm happy to have finished this chapter before Christmas, even though the plot isn't moving quite yet...(I'm still setting things up.)  
Don't forget to check the Razing Ragnarok section in my profile to see a pic I drew of Chaud and ProtoMan, as they appear in this fic.  
And seeing english isn't my first language, nor am I very experienced at writing, so if there's anything about the fic that feels wrong to you, don't be too shy to notify me! 


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